All posts tagged: Great Writing Challenge

Post #9: Puppies! (Part one of a zillion)

Published by

Welcome to the ninth post of the Great Writing Challenge of 2012. Five days a week for six months, I will be given a topic to write about. The stipulation: it must be 250 words (or more), and positive in tone. If you would like to suggest topics for me to write about, please email me at TheRebeccaProject [at] gmail [dot] com. Today, I spent a lovely day hiking the hills in Marin with Mary and puppies Patrick and Charlie. It was a beautifully clear day, and surprisingly warm: amazing weather for winter. There were numerous times on the trail where it as not marked, or poorly marked. So what did we do? We pulled out the iPhone and Google Mapped it. For most of the walk, we could see the city, and the top of the Golden Gate, so we were not super worried. But it just made me think about how we rely and turn to technology, instead of going to visit the Visitors’ Centre to pick ourselves up a map. So anyhoo, …

Post #8: BART

Published by

Welcome to the eighth post of the Great Writing Challenge of 2012. Five days a week for six months, I will be given a topic to write about. The stipulation: it must be 250 words (or more), and positive in tone. If you would like to suggest topics for me to write about, please email me at TheRebeccaProject [at] gmail [dot] com. BART trains are cool. They look like portals from the future, prepared to take you back with them. Even the horns sound digital. Harrison Ford caught one in Blade Runner. Or maybe I just made that up. But he totally would have. Each day, I ride the futuristic cars to work and back. BART is my preferred form of public transport, and mostly an enjoyable experience. The system is known for its large, comfy seats, and has a completely different feel from the hard plastic seats on trains in New York and London. I am a creature of habit and each day, I make a beeline for my preferred seat: the reverse-riding left …

Post #7: University at 17?

Published by

Welcome to the seventh post of the Great Writing Challenge of 2012. Five days a week for six months, I will be given a topic to write about. The stipulation: it must be 250 words (or more), and positive in tone. Thanks to Maia for the topic suggestion. If you would like to suggest topics for me to write about, please email me at TheRebeccaProject [at] gmail [dot] com. I was 17 in my final year of high school, and took to telling those who asked me what I was planning to do with the rest of my life that I was looking forward to becoming an astrophysicist. They’d reply with an exaggerated “ooooh!”, raise their eyebrows and change the subject. Most were probably conscious of the fact that they had no idea just what an astrophysicist does, so they thought it best to seem impressed and move on. Truth is, I never knew what I wanted to do. I just told people that so they’d stop asking me. My mind changed more frequently than …

Post #6: Packing Light

Published by

Welcome to the sixth post of the Great Writing Challenge of 2012. Five days a week for six months, I will be given a topic to write about. The stipulation: it must be 250 words (or more), and positive in tone. If you would like to suggest topics for me to write about, please email me at TheRebeccaProject [at] gmail [dot] com. On Twitter this afternoon, I heard all my favorite bloggers discuss what they are packing for Alt Summit in Sat Lake City. Truth is, I’m super jealous. Maybe I should add Alt Summit to my Life List? I’m sure Maggie Mason would approve. I love hearing about what people deem important to pack. To some, it’s mundane and they want to head straight for the photos, but I think there’s a real art to packing light. Maggie Mason sometimes posts about what she packs for a trip away, and it’s amazing how she can fit everything into an overnight bag (see HERE and HERE. This woman knows how to pack). So whilst I …

Post #3: Write Something About the NFL

Published by

Welcome to the third post of the Great Writing Challenge of 2012. Five days a week for six months, I will be given a topic to write about. The stipulation: it must be 250 words (or more), and positive in tone. If you would like to suggest topics for me to write about, please email me at therebeccaproject [at] gmail [dot] com. I live in a city that has two NFL teams, neither of which have been any good since I have moved here. I have trekked down to see the local soccer team, the San Jose Earthquakes, and I have seen the greatest team in the world (FC Barcelona) play Mexican side Chivas at Candlestick. I have even watched the Superbowl live in Australia, New Zealand and Ireland (if mostly for the half time entertainment), but never have I been to a Niners or Raiders game in the flesh. And I’m totally fine with that. Coming from a sports obsessed nation, particularly one that likes to remind you that we’re such an athletically gifted …

Post #2: The American South

Published by

Welcome to the second post of the Great Writing Challenge of 2012. Five days a week for six months, I will be given a topic to write about. The stipulation: it must be 250 words (or more), and positive in tone. If you would like to suggest topics for me to write about, please email me at therebeccaproject [at] gmail [dot] com. In a recent New York Times posting, ‘An American Dream – In Switzerland?’, it discussed a photographer Yann Gross’ travels around a section of Switzerland where the locals have adopted what I would associate as the culture of the American South: honkey tonk, tattoos, Confederate flags, line dancing, motorbike clubs, drag racing, trailers, roadside diners. Gross published a book, Horizonville, of his travels through this industrial region of one of the world’s most scenically breathtaking countries. His subjects have woven a fascination for American culture into their lives and produced a Swiss-American hybrid, and Horizonville explores the connection to America in the context of living life in the Rhone Valley. What’s interesting to …